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Thursday, June 2nd, 2005

Tim Fite signs with ANTI-

Anti Records, home to such legendary artists as Tom Waits, Nick Cave, Jolie Holland, Neko Case, and Daniel Lanois, is proud to announce the signing of Brooklynite artist TIM FITE. FITE’s debut album Gone Ain’t Gone is set for release on September 13, 2005.

Gone Ain’t Gone, a wry, anachronistic, copyright-defying, country/hip-hop collage, was made mostly from cds rescued from dollar bins; Australian bar bands, DC garage-punks, and demos from up-and-never coming rock bands. It’s all sampled, looped and laid down as the blueprint for FITE’s intriguing avant-folk vision of musical crime and resuscitation.

While FITE is by no means a virtuosic instrumentalist, he knows how to build a compelling song. His primary talent lies in his knack for finding, stealing and transforming other people's music into his own, utilizing his resonant voice to lend a disquieting emotional sincerity to the mix. It is impossible to ignore that his liberal pilfering flies in the face of intellectual property laws, but FITE doesn't feel as though he is doing anything questionable: “Everybody steals. The important question is how you steal, who you steal from, and whether or not there is an adverse effect as a result of your thievery.”

FITE’s thievery and DIY ethic ultimately find and express their cultural roots in the traditions of both hip-hop and country music — two genres birthed from adversity, given life when necessity forced folks to make art by using the elements around them (like the plank of a diddly bo or a set of old turntables). In the same way, FITE approaches music-making with little more than his four favorite chords, a love of Woody Guthrie and Public Enemy, and a stack of other people’s sadly forgotten records—the emerging sound is like no other: natural, unique and teeming with fresh blood.